Smart Fox Homes, a New Jersey based FSBO website was launched today. In the spirit of FSBO rhetorics it promises customers to save on real estate commissions by selling your home on your own. Currently it offers three types of listings with a prices that range from free (two months) to $59.95 (six months).
Timothy O’Connell, Director of Business System Development of Smart Fox Homes was quoted in a press release:
Due to the downturn in the real estate market, many people simply cannot afford to pay a real estate commission and break even, let alone make a profit
It is not that hard to predict that Smart Fox Homes are going to be faced with other well established FSBO websites. The website lacks any tools that may help sellers to determine the value of their homes.
Hopefully as with many other FSBO websites, Smart Fox Homes will also become a good source of future listings to the real estate professionals.
It appears as the good folks at Inman News have decided to redesign their website. The redesign is not only about feel and look of the website. Their new logo now says: “Inman News- The first word in real estate” as opposed to the former slogan “Inman News- Where the real estate and technology connect”:
I personally am fine with either slogan, but I do like the new design. If you have not subscribed to the latest from Inman News you might be missing out on a lot of real estate news.
I am not sure what do they mean by “beta” though. The Inman News has been around ate least from the mid 90’s. Unless of course they are referring to the new design as a beta, or testing stage.
The Inman News is one of my favorite real estate websites. Do you read Inman News?
Fizber website just got bigger by about… 15,000 pages. Can you imagine? Well this time around it seams like they are trying to provide some useful data about neighborhood safety. Announcing the launch of crime and safety resource on their website today, Fizber’s VP of Marketing Julia Foster was quoted in a press release:
Crime rates are based on local crime statistics from the FBI and the U.S. Justice Department. We reveal the safety from crime for every community in America, and show you how each community compares to other communities nationwide, so you can make good decisions for you and your family.
Not so long ago I posted a video, in which founding CEO of PropertyMaps defended their decision to publish neighborhood data on sex offenders. Fizber’s safety information does not include that information.
I has been more than one week since list of top 100 Real Estate Blogs went live. If you made the list before we launched the list, you may be well aware of it. If you have not heard about it. It is a list of real estate blogs that ranks blog. To rank real estate blogs we have factored in Google PR, Technorati Rank and Alexa Rankings. It is a first list of its kind and of course such an attempt will draw some attention and criticisms. So today I would like to acknowledge the incredible feedback we received and to respond to some criticisms.
Thanks For The Buzz
Fir of all I would like to take time and thank every blogger and blog that linked to my original post announcing the list or to the list itself:
Now I would like to respond to some criticisms. While I tried to respond to some of it personally on the blogs offering their feedback, I think t is important to gather the criticism into one place. I have tried to counter the criticism I found so far, but I have decided to include the criticism or rather my response to what I see as trends in criticism of our list. I tried hard to respond to particular posts personally, however it doing so I mark all the criticism with hope to improve our list or or to respond to something in a greater detail here on my own blog.
The list is unreliable. Just because we use rankings that are not necessarily most reliable does not mean our list not worthy to take a look at. Out of all list that rank blogs and websites our list is the most focused on real estate even though some blogs that are not primarily write about real estate slipped through. However unreliable one may hold Google, Technorati and Alexa- these statistics are hard to manipulate and artificially inflate therefore it will be very hard to progress on our list as well.
I can’t compete with big Blogs. There is an underlying consensus among real estate bloggers out there that in order to have nigh rankings you either need to write about technology or otherwise to be connected to “Silicon Valley” or you need to have a multi authored blog. I would argue that when it comes to blogging it is not your connection and your niche that are crucial to your success - it is the content of your blog. Here is an example. Doshdosh- an internet marketing blog is barely year old and is authored by one person. In just over one year not only the blog gained 11,000 subscribers but is widely accepted as leading blog in that particular niche.
The list has many blogs that should not have been there. I have tried to be diligent in compiling the list. I started with 30+ blogs from my Google reader. Then I moved to the blogrolls of the blogs I subscribe to and other websites like Blogflux to come up with the “first” 100 blogs. I certainly may have made a mistake or two and if your notice a blog that should is “home an living” kind of website please let me know and I will correct.
What other value our list brings comparing let say to Blogflux. Our list is more focused. I examine carefully each submission before including the blog into our list. We give each blog clean and search engine friendly links. We aggregate the latest post form each blog on the list.
Infringing on NAR trademark. I just have to say that it was on oversight on my par when we purchased the domain. There was no intention to neither compete with nor associate ourselves with NAR. As you an see our list is hosted on it’s own domain now.
Feel free to offer your onion about the Top 100 Real Estate Blogs. If you have a real estate blog feel free to submit it to me via email: vlad @ go-beyond-mls dot com. Special thanks to Mark from 45n5 fro his tireless effort programing the list. If you have not visited the list lately we have 127 blogs already with more submissions in my mailbox. Make sure to bookmark the list for the future reference and use.
Picture credits: atroszko and Daino 16.
After announcing the list of Top 100 Real Estate Blogs, I realize that I left many are under the impression that this list will be published here on this blog. In yesterday’s post I just simply copied pasted the list from http://geekrealtors.com:
As you can see from the above screen shot, there are two main columns on the list. Named Property Links and Real Estate Blogs Top 100. Basically the entire page is produced from data we receive via API from websites like Technorati and Alexa. The Property Links column shows the latest post from the blogs on the list to the left- the Real Estate Top 100.
I do not anticipate to publish the entire list on my blog again any soon, so if you would like to see how your blog is doing you have to visit the above described page yourself. Please remember that the list will be updated once a week.
I know that creating the list I have missed many outstanding real estate blogs. If you have one feel free to submit it to me at vlad @ go-beyond-mls.com
A new website called 96short.com was launched today. The website is aimed at providing assistance to overextended homeowners in Virginia, Maryland and Washington DC. If you live in one of these areas and have fallen behind on your mortgage payment and are facing a foreclosure make sure to visit the website.
A short sale means selling your home for less than what is owed on the mortgage. Short sales can be a good deal for many borrowers - those with piggy-back mortgages, mortgages that exceed the current market value of the property and other overextended homeowners - provided the lender agrees to accept the proceeds of these short sales as payment in full
Matt Maritn, who is also the president of Matt Martin Real Estate, claims that his short sale team has closed on 10,000 of such transactions in the past fourteen years, effectively saving about $1,000,000,000 to customers.
Martin also quoted a real life example of how the short sale can help individual homeowners:
We met a great couple who had purchased a home in Bristow, VA, $630,000 at the height of the market in late 2004.They had taken a Pay Option or Negative Amortizing loan for the property and, when they contacted us, they owed close to $700,000 because of the negative amortization. The biggest problem was that the property was only worth $550,000 and, after fees and commissions, they would only be left with around $510,000 to pay towards the mortgage. We negotiated a short sale with the lender to write off the $190,000. The lender only asked for $5,000 in return for the write-down. The couple was then able to buy a new home in the same neighborhood for $200,000 less than what they were stuck with in their old home.
The idea to compile such a list was born a few months ago. Just as other similar top lists where appearing. After talking to Mark from 45n5- who is an outstanding programmer and internet marketer, a decision was made to bring the idea to fruition. Mark was in charge of programing the list, while my job was to find the blogs to be placed in the list- an easy job I should say for a former real estate agent.
So I present you today with GeerRealtors Top 100 Real Estate Blogs. It is a must bookmark page for many reasons. Not only will you be able to see who is who among real estate bloggers. You can also see the latest posts from the blogs featured on the list. If you are on the list this will give you an opportunity to see how your blog compares to your colleagues and/or competitors. Visit those blogs and see what are they doing that makes them more popular than yours.
If you visit the list, you will notice that there are actually more than 100 blogs.This means that you also can submit your blog, and then work your way to the top. If I have missed your blog feel free to submit your blog, and depending to the rankings elsewhere (Google Page Rank, Alexa Rankings, Technorati Rank) you may very well end up in the top 100. If not, you have some work to do.
The list will be updated once a week, so if you see N/A next to your blog, it means it was added after the last update. Just bookmark the Top 100 Real Estate Blogs and come to look at it one week from now. Finally I hope the list itself will bring you a visitor or two.
And now, without further ado, I present you with the first edition of Top 100 Real Estate Blogs:
March 11, 2008
Smart Fox Homes, a New Jersey based FSBO website was launched today. In the spirit of FSBO rhetorics it promises customers to save on real estate commissions by selling your home on your own. Currently it offers three types of listings with a prices that range from free (two months) to $59.95 (six months).
Posted in Real Estate Websites 
Fir of all I would like to take time and thank every blogger and blog that linked to my original post announcing the list or to the list itself:
Now I would like to respond to some criticisms. While I tried to respond to some of it personally on the blogs offering their feedback, I think t is important to gather the criticism into one place. I have tried to counter the criticism I found so far, but I have decided to include the criticism or rather my response to what I see as trends in criticism of our list. I tried hard to respond to particular posts personally, however it doing so I mark all the criticism with hope to improve our list or or to respond to something in a greater detail here on my own blog. 
A new website called 
GR Rank*
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